Marion Brown

Marion Brown ( born September 8, 1931 in Atlanta, Georgia, † October 18, 2010 in Hollywood, Florida ) was an American jazz musician (alto saxophone, composition), author and musicologist.

Life and work

Brown, who first played in a house band, completed military service in a military band; In 1957 he played with Johnny Hodges in Atlanta. He studied saxophone, clarinet and oboe at Clark College in Atlanta, then law at the African-American Howard University, as well as music education, politics, economics and history. In 1960, he broke off his studies and he went to New York City, where he became friends with the poet Amiri Baraka and about in the city with the emerging free jazz scene came into contact. From 1962, he worked with musicians such as Rashied Ali, Alan Shorter and Archie Shepp, who became his mentor; he had also been Shepp album Fire Music. John Coltrane hired him in the summer of 1965 for the recording of his album Ascension. During this period, Brown also worked with his own groups, including with Stanley Cowell. From 1959 he taught, wrote poetry and music, including a first article about Ornette Coleman, and performed in Baraka's play The Dutchman.

With a grant from the Cité International des Artistes he spent some time in Europe from 1967, where he played with Karl Berger, Steve McCall, Barre Phillips, Alan Silva, Gunter Hampel and Jeanne Lee reinforced his interest in African music. In 1968, the soundtrack to Marcel Camus ' Un été sauvage. " In conjunction with Hampel Brown developed a lyrical language with which he finally anchored their own voice in the canon of free jazz. " Shortly before his return in 1970 in the United States, he took with Hampel, Lee, Anthony Braxton, Bennie Maupin and Chick Corea ECM for his most famous album Afternoon of a Faun in Georgia, "in which he recorded the mood of Debussy's Afternoon of a Faun with a percussive sound and a dynamic collective improvisation ".

In the U.S., he made linguistics and composition techniques of African music into the center of his research and teaching activities. In 1971, Brown was an assistant professor of music at Bowdoin College in Brunswick ( Maine), a position he held until the acquisition of the Bachelor 1974. In addition, he has taught at Brandeis University (1971-1974), the Colby College (1973 /74) and at Amherst College ( 1974-1975 ), one assistant a Wesleyan University ( 1974-1976 ), where he in 1976 the master acquired in ethnomusicology. His final paper he published in the Scriptures Faces and Places: The Music and Travels of a Contemporary Jazz Musician. In addition to teaching he worked with Indian flute and African instruments. His playing and his compositions are characterized by a special peace. He arranged works of Erik Satie and wrote music on Georg Büchner's Woyzeck. He also continued his collaboration with Gunter Hampel. In addition to teaching in Northampton (Massachusetts ), he has also performed at universities and worked as a painter.

Due to health problems - he had a foot amputated - Brown is almost not occurred since 1992. He has also collaborated with composer Harold Budd on his album Pavilion of Dreams. Friends and supporters brought Brown from a nursing home in New York and brought him under in a nursing home in Florida, where he died in October 2010.

Discography (selection)

Lexical entries

• Carlo Bohländer (ed.): Reclams jazz leader. Reclam, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-15-010464-5
• Ian Carr, Brian Priestley, Digby Fairweather (eds.): Rough Guide to Jazz. The ultimate guide to jazz. 1700 artists and bands from the beginning until today. Metzler Verlag, Stuttgart 1999, ISBN 3-476-01584- X
• Richard Cook, Brian Morton: The Penguin Guide To Jazz on CD. Penguin, London 2006, ISBN 0-14-051521-6. ( 8th Edition )
• Martin Kunzler: Jazz Encyclopedia. Vol 1 Rowohlt, Reinbek 2002 ( 2nd edition ), ISBN 3-499-16512-0